More response to the weekend PPV shows

Monday, 25 October 2010 05:42

Dave (or Bryan):

I know you wanted some theater feedback about UFC 121, but since I was at my local watering hole, this is the best I can do.

My local sports bar in Chicago shows every UFC, even the lousy ones. I live in Bridgeport, traditionaly an Irish/Italian hood that has become more diverse over the years with Latinos and Asians. I showed up on Saturday to the bar an hour before start time and I have never seen so many Latinos waiting for tables and crowding the entrance to the bar to watch UFC. Never. I'd peg the bar half white, half Latino, roughly. Maybe more Latino. When Cain dropped Lesnar and they called the fight, the place went beserk. I don't recall it ever being that loud for any fight at a Chicago bar, at least I don't think so. Amazing main event, and props to Cain.

They didn't get the video feed turned on until right before the Gonzaga fight. I'm not sure if it was a problem with Direct TV or the Joe Hand people that provide the fight.

Regards,Jacob BurnettChicago, IL

Hi, Dave/Bryan,

Thumbs down. Another crappy WWE PPV for all the same reasons as usual. This company needs an enema.

Best match - Bryan vs. Ziggler. I'm sure Danielson will be demolished on Raw for having the audacity to get the crowd chanting his name. He's been in the best match on every show since he started working PPV's.

Worst match - Orton vs. Barrett. As bad as Undertaker/Kane was, their match was actually less painful than the previous two so I'm going with the WWE title match. Orton stinks. The guy absolutely never has main event level matches. Alway slow and plodding, never shifts gears, never gets any heat, never builds any drama. He's a cheap pop with a move that has always been over and nothing more. The finish was an insult to the paying customer. Luckily I didn't pay anything for it.

As for the rest of the show...

- I'm sure they were *thrilled* with the loud "WE WANT BLOOD!" chant during the Undertaker/Kane match.

- CM Punk is becoming a babyface simply by being entertaining. It'd be nice if Orton could give that a try.

- Someone needs to tell Aksana that when getting your ass kicked, making sure your dress is covering your ass should be the least of your concerns.

Chris Hodgson

I did not pay for this pay-per-view.

This ppv felt really loooooooooooooong.Opener with Bryan and Ziggler was good. I was glad to see they gave them so much time, and the crowd was really into the match.Otunga and Cena vs. Rhodes and McIntyre was not a good choice in many ways. The only good idea was having Cena work the entire match.Goldust and Dibiase's match was decent, but I found it hard to stay interested.The women's match was completely uninteresting. It's a shame, because I like both Layla and Natalya.Kane and Undertaker was bad all around. I can't justify paying for these main events.The Bragging Rights match was was pretty boring, and no one really stood out to me. It didn't help an already dragging ppv at this point.Orton and Wade was unexciting as well, and did not feel like a main event match at all. Energy level was low throughout.I can't believe they had Cena hit Barrett already.

Overall, I liked the opener, but everything else was pretty forgettable.

I attended Bragging Rights last night and wanted to share some thoughts on it…

There were a fair amount of“good seats still available” throughout the building.No sections were empty by any means but I would have at least expected to see the lower level sold out.

As far as the crowd being dead, I’m not sure what else to expect from a crowd with an event like this.Everything aside from the Daniel Bryan/Dolph Ziggler match felt pretty mediocre, especially the Buried Alive match and Orton vs. Barrett.

The dark match was Chavo vs. MVP, with MVP getting the win.Lots of cheers for MVP and a mixed reaction for Chavo.

There were a number of times during the night where I wasn’t really sure who was supposed to be the heel and who was supposed to be the babyface.Part of this is due to the Nexus, and part is due to the Raw vs. SmackDown tag match.Both cases gave you heel vs. heel and face vs. face situations that left you scratching your head and then you add in John Cena who gets a mixed reaction anyways.There was a “Fire Cena!” chant that broke out briefly during the main event.

Natalya vs. Layla was not as brutal as I’ve come to expect from WWE Divas matches.

Paul Bearer is great.His appearance was by far the best part of the Buried Alive match.

I find the Dashing Cody Rhodes character to be every bit as creepy as Goldust was back when Goldust was new.

Ezekiel Jackson is HUGE.He must lift a lot of weights.

When Jackson and Tyler Reks were in the ring together, from where I was sitting (not all that far from the ring), I could have sworn I was watching Crush vs. Ahmed Johnson.

Orton vs. Barrett felt like the least interesting match on the whole card and as soon as Barrett said “If I don’t win tonight, Cena, you’re fired,” it gave away the finish and that in itself was incredibly disappointing.I was hoping that Miz would come out and save the show by cashing in his Money in the Bank briefcase but with Orton standing on offense during the DQ finish, that hope was killed dead.

Thumbs up to a fun night at a live event, but I’m glad I didn’t buy it on PPV.

Brian Braunschweig

Thumbs Up!

Best match: Smackdown vs RAW Elimination Match

I was at the show live. I had a great time. The audience,particularly the young girls, would "go banana" whenever Orton or Cenawas out there. Rey Mysterio was loved but far less than I would havefigured, though the pop for 619 was pretty huge. The audienceactually loved the Kane vs The Undertaker match quite a lot,especially because the brawling in the crowd made you feel like theywere right by you. I was surprised how focused everyone stayed onthat match. Dolph vs Bryan was good and the audience was hot, as we'donly seen Chavo vs MVP (MVP won) as the warm-up match. The Laycoolpromo before their match got some massive heat with the Brett Favretext messaging and fat women jokes. The crowd enjoyed the EliminationMatch - with a lot of vocal support for Santino and CM Punk. Theykept Edge strong. No one really cared about Reks but Big Zekecaptivated a lot of people. (During the introductions, when TylerReks came out and CM Punk was pretending to mark out at the fact thatReks even had a video. Punk was openingly mocking Reks to by tryingto really the crowd to clap for Tyler.) Everyone was fairly burnedout when it came to the Orton/Barrett match but Cena & Randy broughtback a lot of the young female fans into the mix. Hearty thumbs up!

All of the seats that were available to sit in were full but one ofthe top-top upper decks was completely blocked off. Compared the RAWshow in January (where Mike Tyson hosted/wrestled), I would wagerthere were less people at the PPV. I ran into Adam Jones (guitarplayer for the band Tool) on the arena floor yesterday.

Chris HarringtonSt. Paul, MN

Thumbs in the middle

Best Match: Daniel Bryan vs. Dolph Ziggler

Worst Match: Taker vs. Kane

Don't think the crowd helped this show. Most of the action was good and the show from a booking standpoint was well-executed, but little seemed to click with the live audience.

Still, nobody bought this show and if it wasn't on Sky Sports I would never have watched it.

Paul Philbin

Dave,

I was at the fights last night. Thought it was a great show (excluding the Shields fight, which I found myself mentally calculating how I'm going to do my retirement). But, I wanted to ask about a few things I read concerning Lesnar at the end of the fight. There's at least one report (see below) that says Lesnar was asking for the fight to be stopped.